There is a great in-depth article on the Tazawa situation. It discusses the repercussions of Tazawa forgoing the NPB draft and becoming an international free agent. The outcome will have a immediate and prolonged effect on Japanese Professional Baseball and Major League Baseball. This could be the single most important decision in decades. Let’s take a quick look:
If Tazawa is allowed to forgo the NPB draft, will many other draft ready players follow suit? Probably. It’s really all about the money and the competition. The maximum bonus NPB can give out to any draft eligible player is $1 million. In MLB, there is no specific amount, only a recommended slot by the Commissioner, in which big market teams mostly ignore. Will the quality of players and competiton in Japan go down? Definitely. But this can work both ways. In order to rectify this part of the equation, Japanese Professional Baseball will require that they can sign any MLB free agent, even after a team fails to sign their draft pick (e.g. Aaron Crow and Pedro Alvarez). These players could then go to Japan to play ball and eventually be posted when there stock is even higher. I highly doubt MLB draft picks would like to go through this process. But it’s entirely conceivable. Will this create animosity between the two organizations or can they work together? Time will tell.
Very interesting stuff.
